Introduction
In February of 2013 the International Olympic Committee (IOC) voted wrestling out of the Summer Olympics expected to start in 2020. In the Olympic Games in 708 B.C., wrestling made its debut, which makes it one of the founding sports of the Olympics. This information both saddened and infuriated many people involved within wrestling communities. In order to resolve the issue, many big name wrestlers of the past had come together to save the sport. Within a 7 month period the IOC changed their decision to completely get rid of Olympic wrestling. After the uproar, the IOC stated that the sport would only be guaranteed a spot in the 2020 and 2024 Olympics. Wrestling as a sport has not evolved much throughout the long history it carries …show more content…
These have both been defined by United World Wrestling. The first style is Greco-Roman wrestling, where “competitors use only their arms and upper bodies to attack. They can hold only those same parts of their opponents.” The second is freestyle where “wrestlers can use their legs for pushing, lifting and tripping, and they can hold opponents above or below the waist.” ("Wrestling Greco-Roman Equipment and History", 2013) These two types of Olympic wrestling have been defined this same way for a long time, but over the years the points and time given per round have changed numerous times. The IOC recently changed the points and time given per round effective to start in the 2020 Summer Olympics. They did this in hopes that it will make the sport more interesting by making points for certain things worth less, the opponents will be more aggressive during the match. Along with that, they also changed the number of periods in the match to two 3-minute rounds instead of three 2-minute rounds, giving the wrestlers less time to recuperate and more time to keep the match going. …show more content…
In 2002, the IOC commissioned a review of Olympic sports that said wrestling had a "lack of global popularity" as well as "relatively low broadcast and press coverage." The problem stemmed from the public 's confusion between wrestling 's two disciplines: Greco-Roman, which forbids holds below the waist, and freestyle, which allows them. The report recommended dropping one of the disciplines from the 2008 Beijing Games, which didn 't happen.
That being said one can see that the IOC has been thinking about dropping wrestling from the Olympics for quite some time. This is clearly an issue of popularity and not an economic matter though there are over 200 nations that compete in wrestling some countries may feel that others are way too dominant in the sport. When the IOC first revealed that they were taking wrestling out of the Olympics the council didn’t give any supporting evidence to their decision. In that further research has not led to any economic trouble behind the matter. (Woo, Futterman, & Germano,
In February of 2013 the International Olympic Committee (IOC) voted wrestling out of the Summer Olympics expected to start in 2020. In the Olympic Games in 708 B.C., wrestling made its debut, which makes it one of the founding sports of the Olympics. This information both saddened and infuriated many people involved within wrestling communities. In order to resolve the issue, many big name wrestlers of the past had come together to save the sport. Within a 7 month period the IOC changed their decision to completely get rid of Olympic wrestling. After the uproar, the IOC stated that the sport would only be guaranteed a spot in the 2020 and 2024 Olympics. Wrestling as a sport has not evolved much throughout the long history it carries …show more content…
These have both been defined by United World Wrestling. The first style is Greco-Roman wrestling, where “competitors use only their arms and upper bodies to attack. They can hold only those same parts of their opponents.” The second is freestyle where “wrestlers can use their legs for pushing, lifting and tripping, and they can hold opponents above or below the waist.” ("Wrestling Greco-Roman Equipment and History", 2013) These two types of Olympic wrestling have been defined this same way for a long time, but over the years the points and time given per round have changed numerous times. The IOC recently changed the points and time given per round effective to start in the 2020 Summer Olympics. They did this in hopes that it will make the sport more interesting by making points for certain things worth less, the opponents will be more aggressive during the match. Along with that, they also changed the number of periods in the match to two 3-minute rounds instead of three 2-minute rounds, giving the wrestlers less time to recuperate and more time to keep the match going. …show more content…
In 2002, the IOC commissioned a review of Olympic sports that said wrestling had a "lack of global popularity" as well as "relatively low broadcast and press coverage." The problem stemmed from the public 's confusion between wrestling 's two disciplines: Greco-Roman, which forbids holds below the waist, and freestyle, which allows them. The report recommended dropping one of the disciplines from the 2008 Beijing Games, which didn 't happen.
That being said one can see that the IOC has been thinking about dropping wrestling from the Olympics for quite some time. This is clearly an issue of popularity and not an economic matter though there are over 200 nations that compete in wrestling some countries may feel that others are way too dominant in the sport. When the IOC first revealed that they were taking wrestling out of the Olympics the council didn’t give any supporting evidence to their decision. In that further research has not led to any economic trouble behind the matter. (Woo, Futterman, & Germano,